e-commerce and development report 2002e-commerce and development report 2002 chapter 3: gender,...

United Nations Conference on Trade and Development

E-COMMERCE AND DEVELOPMENT REPORT 2002

Internet version prepared by the UNCTAD secretariat

United Nations

New York and Geneva, 2002

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A. The�relevance�of�gender

The role of new information and communicationtechnologies (ICT) and e-commerce in driving the glo-bal economy is widely recognized: ICT and the Inter-net reach many people, have a wide geographical cov-erage and are efficient in terms of time and cost. Theyfacilitate access to markets, commercial information,new processing technologies and knowledge. But dowomen have equal access to these new technologiesand the Internet? Does e-commerce enhance businessopportunities for women, especially in the developingcountries? What are some of the promising newemployment opportunities for women in the ICT sec-tor, or does it replicate patterns of inequality elsewherein the job market? And what are the main barrierswomen have to overcome to participate actively in thedigital economy?

These questions are increasingly being addressed bywomen’s advocacy groups and non-governmentalorganizations (NGOs) working at the grass-roots levelin both developed and developing countries, as well asby the international community in general. Among theinternational organizations, the International Tele-communication Union (ITU) has taken a leading rolein bringing the gender dimension into the debate onthe digital divide and ICT policy making.1 Through itsWorking Group on Gender Issues, and in cooperationwith other UN bodies, it is actively working towardsintegrating the gender perspectives into the WorldSummit on the Information Society (WSIS), to be heldin Geneva (2003) and in Tunis (2005).

Much of the work done at the international level isfocusing on how ICT can become a tool for theadvancement and empowerment of women, includingin areas such as education and training, health, partic-ipation in public life and the productive sphere. Thischapter will identify the economic opportunities cre-ated for women in the developing countries throughthe use of ICT and e-commerce, as well as the barriersthey face when entering the digital economy. Centralto this debate is the recognition that the digital econ-

omy poses opportunities as well as challenges forwomen that are different from those for men, basedon their different roles and positions in the family andsociety. For example, ICT and e-commerce work wellfor women entrepreneurs (who in many developingcountries account for the majority of owners of small,medium and micro enterprises), allowing them to savetime and costs while trying to reach out to new clientsin domestic and foreign markets. As this chapter willshow, new job opportunities created by ICT throughoutsourcing in the services sector are also benefitingwomen, who account for significant shares of theworkforce in the information technology (IT)-enabledindustry in developing countries.

On the other hand, women often face greater barriersthan men in receiving education and training that canequip them with computer literacy, foreign languageand business skills. In the developing part of theworld, parents tend to invest more in the education ofthe male rather than the female child. Women alsooften find it more difficult to engage in new forms ofself-employment created by ICT, such as telekiosks orcybercafes if they do not have the same access as mento family property or institutional finance. Womenmake up the majority of the rural poor in the develop-ing countries, where access to ICT infrastructure isless available than in urban areas. Given their increasedresponsibilities at home, they have less time to accessthe technologies outside their homes or to enhancetheir IT, language or other skills required by the infor-mation economy. Few women work in the higher-skilled areas of the IT-enabled industry and even thosein lower-skilled areas are often hard to retain once theybecome of childbearing age and social and culturalnorms prompt them to leave their jobs and attend tothe young and elderly.

This chapter will address these issues in more depth.Section B will critically examine the extent to which e-commerce and ICT provide women with new eco-nomic opportunities as small business owners or inICT-related employment, such as call centres, tele-working or back-office remote/offline work. SectionC will focus on one of the key factors affecting women

Chapter�3

GENDER,�E-COMMERCE�AND�DEVELOPMENT

64 CHAPTER 3: GENDER, E-COMMERCE AND DEVELOPMENT


in the digital economy: skills and training. It willexplore what kinds of skills are required by the digitaleconomy and which skills women need to acquire inorder to fully participate in the economic and employ-ment opportunities offered by ICT. Section D willaddress other constraints that women may face, suchas access to technologies, availability of finance, for-eign languages and cultural obstacles. Section E willprovide some conclusions and recommendations forincluding gender issues in ICT policy-making.

Unfortunately, there is very little research and docu-mentation on the impact of ICT and e-commerce onwomen in the developing countries. Whatever dataand statistics exist, they are often not disaggregated bygender. Nevertheless, this chapter makes an effort todraw from the existing literature and provide as manyexamples as possible that will give insights into theopportunities and challenges faced by women in thedigital economy. Most of the examples cited in thischapter are taken from the Asian region. This is partlyexplained by the research done so far on the subject,which is heavily focused on Asia, and partly by the factthat certain IT-enabled services have grown exponen-tially in the Asian region, many of which employ alarge number of female workers.

B. Digital�opportunitiesfor�women

Information and communication technologies pro-vide a number of new job opportunities for women, orbusinesses opportunities of which women could availthemselves. This section will explore some of theseopportunities by looking first at the possibilities whiche-commerce could offer to small women businessowners, and second at how ICT could create newemployment opportunities for women through tele-working and IT-enabled services, both of whichemploy a significant proportion of female workers.

1. W omen�as�small�business�owners

E-commerce offers some attractive possibilities forsmall business owners in the developing countries’business-to-consumer (B2C) or retail sector, many ofthe enterprises in which are owned by women.Numerous examples have been cited as digital oppor-tunities for women entrepreneurs along the models oftelecentres in Senegal and Morocco, phone shops inGhana, Internet cafes or kiosks in Thailand andMalaysia, and the Grameen Phone in Bangladesh. The

latter has been cited as a successful example of womenentrepreneurship, where financing from the GrameenBank allows women to buy cellphones and providemobile pay phone services in their shops or local mar-kets at a mutually agreed mark-up with Grameen Tel-ecom.2 These IT-enabled businesses have the advan-tages of low capital and skills requirements (seesection D.3).

Aside from telephony services, women’s handicraftscould also be developed using B2C, although difficul-ties in terms of marketing and management skills, andsupply and delivery logistics need to be addressed. Anumber of success stories concerning B2C endeavoursare to be found in South Asia, Latin America, Africaand the Middle East. In India, an e-marketplace calledIndiaShop eliminated the middlemen in the selling ofsaris. One woman allegedly sold a silk sari she tailoredfor $ 1,100, a price that is way above an averageIndian’s annual income.3 In Peru, a nationwide net-work of housewives called Tortasperu, which isinvolved in baking confectioneries sold over the Inter-net, showcased lucrative work for women at home tak-ing care of children yet providing the country withmuch needed foreign exchange.4 Ethiopia has openeda gift shop that sells, using the Internet, traditionalEthiopian costumes, food items and spices producedby women.5 Finally, handmade products made bywomen artisans in Egypt, Jordan, Lebanon, Moroccoand Tunisia are sold through a virtual shop calledElsouk.6

These digital opportunities are particularly significantfor women in Asia, considering that women head 35per cent of small and medium-sized enterprises(SMEs) (Brisco, 2002). It has been reported that inChina women initiate about 25 percent of new busi-ness start-ups and in Japan four out of five small busi-ness owners are women. The main advantage of theWeb for small home-based businesses is the informa-tion and networking opportunities that would makethese endeavours profitable rather than marginal. AsBrisco (2002) observes, “The ability of women to earnincome at home while raising a family – with the tech-nology to communicate inexpensively with customersaround the world, and handle accounting and orderprocessing online – is adding to the attraction of theInternet for women”.

Despite these success stories in e-retailing, it will benecessary to evaluate carefully in which segments of e-commerce women’s opportunities lie. Women’s pros-pects depend primarily on the trading strength of thecountries concerned. In spite of the publicity given to


CHAPTER 3: GENDER, E-COMMERCE AND DEVELOPMENT 65

e-retailing, its scope and spread in the poorer parts ofthe world have remained small. As discussed earlier inthis report (see chapter 1), the volume and value ofB2B (business-to-business) trade and commerce farexceed the volume and value of B2C worldwide.

It is also important to remember that women usuallysell commodities such as garments or handicraft prod-ucts, the delivery of which cannot take place online. Insuch cases, the use of the Internet is confined to adver-tising, ordering and possibly collecting payments;hence women have to develop strategies to build con-sumers’ confidence in the quality of their goods. Thelimited evidence available so far shows that somewomen have also found a market niche in the buyingand selling of information rather than tangible goods.In addition to the example of the Grameen Phonecited earlier, women in India and Malaysia use onlinedelivery of their services as freelance journalists tonewspapers and other publishers (Mitter, 2001).

2. ICT-enabled�services

More promising opportunities for women lie in theB2B segment of e-commerce. The advances in com-puter and communication technologies have made itpossible to transfer digitized data online when there isan adequate supply of infrastructure and bandwidth.Through the use of networking technologies, largeamounts of information can be transported at verylow cost from the companies’ core offices to satelliteor subcontracting units. This possibility has led com-panies to externalize and decentralize non-core sec-tions of business operations to distant and oftencheaper locations. The targeted sites are usually theones that offer the promises of a cheap, skilled com-puter- and English-literate workforce.

This phenomenon explains why companies in OECDcountries outsource service operations to countriessuch as India or Malaysia (Ng, 2001; Gothoskar, 2000).The International Data Corporation (IDC) estimatedthat spending on IT outsourcing had reached $ 56 bil-lion in 2000 and would exceed $ 100 billion by 2005.7There has been some evidence of companies in devel-oping countries outsourcing operations within thecountry as well as to other developing countries wherewages are even cheaper. Some of the Indian compa-nies, for example, look towards Nepal for the requisiteworkforce at times of peak demand, particularly fromabroad. In Malaysia, subcontracting or outsourcingtakes place primarily within national boundaries.

There is a relationship between the availability of askilled, English-speaking female workforce and whereoutsourcing normally happens. From this, one canalso propose the hypothesis of the existence of a rela-tionship between the availability of a skilled femaleworkforce and foreign direct investment in informa-tion processing work in the developing countries. Thesoftware services sector in countries such as India andthe Philippines could support this hypothesis. The sal-ary differences between the United States and India,or the Philippines, for similar skills are considerable.8Yet these differences cannot fully explain the absenceof relocation of software services to countries such asBangladesh or Uganda where salaries are even lower.In addition to the requisite skills, the success of repli-cating the experience of India or Philippines dependson creating the right policy framework (ESCAP, 2001).

Software and IT-enabled services could be export-ori-ented as in the case of India and the Philippines; theycould also be domestically oriented as is in the case ofMalaysia, China and Brazil. The global expansion ofthose services has broadened the job prospects ofwomen in new areas. The limited statistics that wehave so far indicate that women in some of the Asianand Latin American countries occupy more than 20per cent of professional jobs in software services. Thisfigure is higher than in any other field of engineering(Arun and Arun, 2002; Ng, 2001, Mitter, 2000, Gaio,1995).

Recent research and projections have indicated thatthe prospects for women lie more in the IT-enabledservices than in software services. The worldwidedemand for IT-enabled services or business processoutsourcing (BPO) is expected to grow at a dramaticrate in the coming decade, reaching $ 611.4 billion bythe year 2005.9 India hopes to capture a large share ofthis newly created market. With revenues of $ 870 mil-lion from IT-enabled services in 2000-2001 and anannual growth rate of 66 per cent, it currently has thepotential to address 38 per cent of that market.10

Again, there are no gender-disaggregated statistics onemployment arising out of these outsourced IT-ena-bled services from the developing world. According tothe Deputy Director of the Confederation of IndianIndustries (CII), in India at least 40 per cent of thesenewly created jobs are given to, and taken by,women.11

Remote services or IT-enabled services largely consistin the relocation of back-office operations.12 One hasto be cautious about the future, however, given thatthere are various types of back-office services requir-



ing different levels of skills from women and men. Theincreasing trend towards outsourcing by major Amer-ican and European corporations entails jobs rangingfrom those at the lower end of the skills level wherewomen are mostly employed, such as data entry and

Box 4, as well as other research carried out in India,indicates that women are concentrated in those areasthat need routine or discretionary skills (Mitter andSen, 2000), whereas women are less visible in special-ized areas of back-office operations. It is worth moni-toring this gender differential as the next round oftechnological changes, for example in the areas ofvoice recognition and image processing by computers,may make some of these skills less saleable in the inter-national market. For the benefit of the women and foraugmenting or retaining the competitive advantage of

countries, policy makers need to ensure that womenreceive the same opportunities and encouragement toacquire skills that could equip them for more complexand specialized jobs.

The Outsourcing Institute, which developed the Out-sourcing ICT Index for the United States based on asurvey of buyers and sellers, has observed a changingpattern of areas being outsourced to Internet andintranet services such as network management, datacentre management, and end-user support and webhosting, owing to the increase in e-commerce activi-

data capture, to those at the higher end such as soft-ware programming, geographical information systems(GIS) and systems analysis. There is a discernible trendtowards hiring women for operations that require lesscomplex skills (box 4).

Box�4

Gender�structure�in�back-office�services�(India)

Routine: requiring basic skills – women predominate• Data capture and processing• Customer call centres – for routine queries, order taking and referrals• Hotel or rental car reservations• Virtual service centres (e.g. home delivery pizza companies)

Discretionary: requiring technical training and problem solving – women predominate• Data verification and repair (e.g. optically scanned documents)• Claims processing• Mailing list management• Remote secretarial services• Customer call centres – account queries and after-sales support

Specialized: requiring specific expertise and managerial authority – men predominate• Accounting, bookkeeping, payroll processing• Electronic publishing• Website design and management• Customer call centres – problem/dispute resolution• Technical transcription (e.g. medical, legal)• Medical records management• Technical online support• Indexing and abstracting services• Research and technical writing

Source: Adapted by Swasti Mitter from I.T. Information Technology, vol. 11, no 2, December 2001, EFY Enterprises Pvt Ltd, New Delhi, p. 29.



ties.13 Thus, if women are to increase their share in theabove services, they have to be increasingly exposed toand trained in Internet skills, in contrast to the earlyphase of the ICT-related task of assembling electron-ics, as found in Asia and Latin America.

Teleworking:�home-based�or�institution-based?

The outsourcing or externalizing of business proc-esses to distant units within or across the nationalboundary could range from satellite offices, such ascall centres, to homes of employees or vendors or tooffices of customers or clients. With the computer and

“Tele” implies distance and teleworking refers to ICT-mediated distant work. The term covers both home-based work or telecommuting and institution-basedwork as carried out in call centres, neighbourhoodcentres or satellite offices.

Home-based teleworking could, in theory, enhance theparticipation of women in the digital economy as it

a modem, a woman can be connected to the headoffice and can perform her professional work from adistant site such as a neighbourhood centre or her ownhome. This is possible as long as her work involvesstoring, processing, retrieving and delivering digitizedinformation. This new mode of working is known asteleworking and has received much attention, particu-larly in the context of women’s career prospects.14 Theuse of ICT in itself can, in theory, offer a solution thatis attractive both to women and to the corporate sec-tor interested in retaining skilled women employees(box 5).

Box�5

Changing�modes�of�working�could�be�of�benefit�to�the�corporate�sector

I look forward to the potential of teleworking for retaining our highly trained, highly skilled women employees inbusiness during their childbearing and childbearing stage. In my organisation, we value women’s skills and contributionand regret if they have to leave their profession because of the inflexibility in demands made on their time. Perhapsteleworking could find the solution whereby women can keep in touch with the changing technology and perform atleast some of the functions from home.

Source: Speek delivered by F.C. Kohli, Vice President of the Tata Consultancy Services, Mumbai, India, at the Final Workshop on Teleworking andTeletrade in India; organized by UNU-INTECH, Maastricht, and the National Centre for Software Technology, Mumbai, December 200.

allows a certain flexibility in both the timing and loca-tion of work (Mitter, 2000; Mitter and Efendioglu,1997). Women with caring responsibilities at homewelcome this flexibility, but not without reservation.Whereas some women appreciate the opportunitiesthat teleworking brings, the majority fear that thehome-based work will deprive them of the status ofworking women and hinder their professional or busi-ness efficiency (boxes 6 and 7).

Box�6

Some�women�enjoy�teleworking

Exteacher Rani, who majored in the Tamil language, taught for oneyear, got married, and had a child in 1996. Becauseshe could not obtain any domestic help, she resigned from the teaching profession to take care of her child. She is nowteleworking from home, working as a Tamil translator for a multimedia company. She stresses that she is workingbecause she loves to, rather than for the money. She is disciplined in her work and meets deadlines. Rani, who owns herown computer and printer, is happy teleworking as it saves time and energy. ”Other things can be done at the same time;there is more control in my work and it is more flexible. I would not have chosen to work if I could not do it fromhome.”

Source: Mitter (2001, p.23).



Surveys of home-based teleworking carried out inMumbai and Kuala Lumpur revealed that women hada preference for institution-based teleworking as in callcentres (home-based teleworking accounted for only1.0 and 0.35 per cent respectively). According to Ngand Khoo (2000), in Malaysia, “interviews withwomen’s groups indicated that the (institution-based)centres, commercial and state sponsored, may be theideal site for externalised work that will allow women(and men) to combine work with collective childcarefacilities; enable women (and men) with peer groupsand thus allow them to acquire and improve their tacitskills; and provide facilities for state and corporate sec-tor supported vocational training in the field of com-puter literacy”.

Managerial concerns may also explain the low preva-lence of home-based teleworking in India and Malay-sia. In a survey of management perception of tele-working in Malaysia, most respondents reported thatin Malaysian culture face-to-face interaction wasessential (Ng, 2001). In India too, research revealed acautious attitude on the part of management towardshome-based teleworking. In the financial sector, forexample, companies find it prudent to outsource workto call centres rather than to teleworkers.

In institution-based teleworking it is easy to monitorand supervise employees in the traditional way,whereas widespread implementation of home-basedteleworking will require a fundamental shift in the cul-ture of management from direct supervision to a basisof trust. For self-employed and freelance workers,home-based teleworking will involve self-managementand time management skills. It is important forwomen to acquire these skills in order to avoid being

distracted by household chores or over working whileteleworking from home.

There is no uniformity in the preference for types oftelework among women in the developing countries.Age and stage of life are key factors in mouldingwomen’s choice regarding the type of telework. InMumbai, while young women work in call centres oroffices of foreign airline companies in the exportprocessing zones, older women, with young children,opt for and receive home-based telework. Companiessuch as Datamatics – a rapidly growing software house– receive assignments from their international clients(box 8). In turn, they pass these to women teleworkerswho work from their homes, mostly online and withtheir own computers. These home-based teleworkerscomprise a wide range of women: housewives, doc-tors, lawyers and chartered accountants. All that theyhave in common is that they had to give up regularemployment at some stage for the sake of their fami-lies. Teleworking gives them a welcome and much-needed opportunity to be in touch with the world ofwork. Yet it is difficult to ensure that these women canprogress, with adequate access to training and child-care, to high value-added jobs (Mitter, 2000).

The experience of Malaysia is similar. “The case stud-ies in software, as well as in printing and publishing,indicate that some women often opt for and find sat-isfaction in home-based work, either as freelancer oras employees. This happens in a particular phase oftheir life cycle, especially when there are inadequatechild care facilities” (Ng and Khoo, 2000). The provi-sion of childcare thus remains a key issue in recruiting,retaining and retraining women in the new economy,as it was in the old economy.

Box�7

Other�women�feel�concerned

Due to the prevailing notions that home-based work is essentially women’s work, it is likely that companies adoptingtelework systems would prefer women. Women, too, might be tempted to opt for telework as it enables them to managetheir multiple roles effectively. While the system provides women with the possibility of managing their homes and earn-ing a living, there is a danger that their contribution to society will remain invisible. It would not change their existinggender inequity in the home or the prevailing stereotypes that domestic work is essentially women’s work.

Source: Mitter (2001, p. 23.)



Call�centres

With regard to institution-based telework, call centreshave received much attention from policy makers,donor agencies and UN bodies. In some countries,such as India, Malaysia, the Philippines and Jamaica,call centres have already proved to be a success inallowing women to participate in the digital economy.

The proportion of women employed by call centresvaries from 40-70 per cent (Gothoskar, 2000; Ng,2001). They tend to be between 20 and 25 years of ageand in most cases this is their first job. In view of theprojected growth of these call centres, women arelikely to benefit at least numerically from this segmentof e-commerce.

However, the question of sustainability needs to beaddressed. There are risks of a reduction in demandfor outsourcing call centre services to developingcountries resulting from the improvement of voicerecognition by computers.15 In addition, changes intechnology may alter the volume and the nature of callcentre service provision. Instead of providing a centralbase for teleworking, call centre services may be pro-vided virtually, supported by fast data communicationlinkages among a network of home-based teleworkers.Again, the deployment of web-based technologiesmay reduce the market for call centre service provi-sion. In banking, for example, customers may conducttheir own transactions. In this new environment,

instead of focusing on a single task, institutions suchas call centres or satellite offices will be engaged inmultidimensional tasks. Women therefore need tohave access to appropriate training and lifelong educa-tion in order to retain their share in this changing mar-ket.

Second, there is a prospect of “burn out” syndrome.As Ng (2001) reports, “While most call centre workersexpressed job satisfaction, there were also complaintsabout how stressful the job was. One reason given wasthe highly competitive environment as incentives aregiven to top performers in call success rates (for exam-ple, in debt collection efforts), implying reprimandsand threats of dismissals for low success rates. Theseemployees have to deal most civilly with their recipi-ents many of whom tend to be abusive or even hyster-ical. While the call centre industry has the ability toprovide young women with the means of entry intothe banking sector, the danger lies with it being a dead-end job, with limited career promotion prospects.”

For women, call centres located on the outskirts of cit-ies reduce the need to commute; for the managementthey offer the possibility of adequate supervision forensuring quality control. Call centres, by decentralizingbusiness and work, bring new opportunities forwomen, away from the city centres, to be included inthe B2B segment of e-commerce.

Box�8

Management�perception�of�teleworking�(India)

The case of Datamatics, India

Teleworking was introduced in Datamatics in 1990 with 10 teleworkers. Over the last nine years the number of tele-workers has grown to 600, mainly owing to enhanced telecom facilities and network infrastructure.

Datamatics prefers women teleworkers, though the prerequisites for applying for the job are quite strict. However, arecent advertisement placed by Datamatics received an overwhelming response and they received more than 3,000applications. The company has devised a unique method to monitor the work carried out by the teleworkers. Each typeof work is given to two or more people who are unaware of each another. The company uses a software package thatcompares the completed work submitted by the teleworkers with the original in order to identify if there are any mis-takes. Work that is found to be 100 per cent accurate is accepted. Hundred per cent redundancies are built into the sys-tem. This method of scrutinising has been found very effective over the years.

Source: Gothoskar (2000, p. 2287).



C. Capacity�building:�rationalefor�a�“gender�lens”

The previous examples have demonstrated that ICTand e-commerce can create a number of promisingeconomic opportunities for women in developingcountries. They have also pointed to the various obsta-cles that need to be addressed in order to enhancewomen’s participation in the information economy.One of the most important impediments to women’sengaging in ICT-enabled employment possibilities

Why is there such an uneven distribution of male andfemale employees across ICT-related occupations andwhat could be done to address this? The training pol-icies in developing countries are in theory gender-neu-tral. In practice, however, they are often geared to thelife cycle and aspirations of men. Women, particularlyof childbearing age, find it difficult to cope with thetraining given either by employers or by private sectorinstitutions. The drop-out rate for women even in thehigh-skilled software services sector has been alarm-ing, even in areas where there is a need for trained per-sonnel (Arun and Arun, 2002; Ng, 2001). A surveyundertaken in the software industry in Kerala, India,

documents how women themselves settle for a lessdemanding position in order to have more time fortheir family and to maintain the overall quality of life(see box 9).

1. W orldwide�demand�and�supplyof�ICT-related�skills

The major ICT markets are now faced with a seriousshortage of IT skills. IDC (2000) estimated a total of3.7 million IT jobs in 2000 (excluding people whoused some IT expertise in their main functions). In

relates to skills and training and will be considered inthis section.

Assessing the parity between women and men in thedigital economy is a complex task. As table 14 shows,in the software sector, women in Malaysia are becom-ing numerically almost as visible as men. However,they are generally clustered in the low-skilled end ofthe hierarchy with little prospect of career progression,while male workers dominate the technical and mana-gerial occupations.

Table�14

Employment�pattern�of�software�services�companies�in�Malaysia�in�1999

Company Co. A* Co. B Co. C Co. D Co. E Co. F Co. G Co. H Co. I Co. J Total

Level in organization M F M F M F M F M F M F M F M F M F M F M F

ManagementExecutiveNon-executive

1737

022

1245

325

1012

07

832

518

10

00

76

61

312

05

318

34

123

00

145

06

63230

1788

Technical 7 0 9 0 0 0 58 4 0 0 6 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 80 4

Administrative 3 17 0 11 0 3 6 20 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 2 10 0 3 1 22 54

Clerical 27 109 0 0 0 0 7 12 0 1 0 3 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 34 141

Dispatch 0 016 0 0 1 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 1 0

Total 91 164 66 39 23 10 111 59 1 1 19 10 15 5 21 9 34 0 49 7 430 304

Source: Ng (2001, p. 115).M = male; F= femaleNotes:1. Management includes directors, managers, consulting managers and assistant managers.2. Executive includes systems analysts, analyst programmers, executives, network specialists, consultants, Internet technicians, engineers,

project leaders, project team leaders, finance personnel and accountants.3. Non-executive is divided into two categories:

ii) Technical – technical writers, computer operators and conversion operators;ii) Administration – administrators/supervisors, support coordinators, executive assistants, secretaries and receptionists; clerical (data

entry clerks and clerical staff); and dispatch.* Company A has a total of 92 full-time employees and 163 contract staff (11 supervisors and 152 clerks).



2004, the total vacancies for IT positions are predictedto reach 2 million, but the demand and supply for ITworkers will be unevenly distributed. Worldwide theskills gap will reach 28 per cent of demand by 2004,with the highest shortage in Latin America (63 percent), Europe/Middle East and Africa (40 per cent),followed by North America (26.5 per cent) and Asia/Pacific (12 per cent). In absolute figures, IDC esti-mates the IT labour shortage to be highest in Europe/Middle East/Africa with 1 million, followed by LatinAmerica (425,000), Asia/Pacific (300,000) and NorthAmerica (235,000). According to IDC, the demand forIT skills will grow highest in the Asia/Pacific region,but as the supply also grows at higher rates, the skillsgap will not be as dramatic as in other regions. In fact,the supply of IT skills is the highest worldwide in theAsian region, and is expected to total 2.2 million pro-fessionals by 2004 (up from 590,000 in 2000). Asia/Pacific would account for 47 per cent of the globalsupply of IT professionals in 2004. Brazil, the UnitedStates and Germany are expected to be the countriesneeding most IT professionals by 2004 (705,000), fol-lowed by the United Kingdom (175,733), China(136,765) and Mexico (118,848).

Although many technology workers were laid off inthe United States after the dotcom crisis of 2000, thedemand for IT workers has increased again in 2002:

according to a survey by the Information TechnologyAssociation of America (ITAA), there may be as manyas 600,000 unfilled IT jobs in 2002.16

The implications of this prevailing trend in demandfor IT skills outstripping their supply are promisingfor women. For one, women’s labour force participa-tion rates have been increasing in developing coun-tries. In East Asia, North-East Asia and South-EastAsia, women constitute more than two fifths of thelabour force; in China, women’s labour force participa-tion is nearly three fourths (Brisco, 2002). Secondly,the shortage of skills in developed countries such asthe United States and even in Europe has led manycorporate executives to outsource IT work to develop-ing countries, thus offering many digital opportunitiesfor women’s employment in the ICT sector (see previ-ous section). Finally, the Internet has the potential toempower women business owners in Asia and otherdeveloping regions and could therefore ensure a levelplaying field for women and men.

2. Activities�and�skills�required�bythe�ICT�corporate�sector

In order to enhance women’s participation in e-com-merce at all levels, it is important to identify areas ofexpertise needed by the corporate sector for e-com-

Box�9

Reasons�for�women�leaving�highly�paid�jobs:�Examples�from�software�companies�in�K erala,�India

Normal working hours were eight hours per day for six days a week. However, employees from all categories felt thatthey spent more time than this in the work place, largely because of tight project deadlines and the need to put in extrahours to meet those deadlines. Both men and women with children and with other domestic responsibilities found thesemarket-driven work practices to be stressful, particularly as teams worked in an extremely competitive way to finishprojects before deadlines.

However, the stress of work–life balances seemed to fall disproportionately on female rather than male software staff.For example, around 82 per cent of women felt that domestic responsibilities were affected by longer working hours,whereas only 69 per cent of men felt the same. Respondents reported that, when someone was sick at home, it waswomen who typically took time off from work. Similarly, many women discontinued software work on becomingpregnant or having children as no support was provided, and they were unable to undertake roles both in the home andthe workplace without such support.

Some mothers who gave up careers in software development had continued to try to make use of their skills by takingup more flexible jobs such as teaching in computer training institutes. For those women who continued (or began)working in software after having children, familial support was the major factor enabling continuity of work.

Source: S. Arun and T.Arun (2002, p.4).



merce in developing countries. This is particularly soas ICT-related trade in services has led to a dichotomybetween ICT-focused and business-focused activities.

For the purpose of monitoring and facilitatingwomen’s entry into key occupations, it could useful toconsider the various core activities for conducting e-commerce. IDC divides ICT services industries intotwo categories (see annex 1 for complete list of cate-gories of the ICT services industry): (a) IT activitiesprimarily targeting information systems and technol-ogy-enabled processes; and (b) business activities pri-marily targeting business processes along the valuechain (e.g. primary activities such as manufacturing,marketing and sales and services; and support activi-ties such as procurement and logistics, humanresource management, and research and develop-ment).

The potential implications for women of this distinc-tion between information technology activities andbusiness activities could be enormous. Many businessactivities and corporate functions, especially back-office support operations such as typing, scheduling,filing or communications, are now becoming ICT-based and it is women in many, if not all, corporateentities who carry out these functions. Thus, womenshould learn these required ICT skills to preventbottlenecks from occurring in the corporate infra-structure. In addition, this framework could be usedfor benchmarking women’s progress, or the lack of it,in key areas of activities related to e-commerce.

3. Few�women�in�high-skilled�jobs�

Given the scenario of a prevailing IT skills shortageand the increasing trend towards business activitiesand corporate functions becoming IT-based, anothermanifestation of the gender digital divide is the lack ofadequate representation of women in the higher eche-lons of IT-related jobs. Few women are actual produc-ers of information technology as Internet content pro-viders, web designers, software programmers orcomputer troubleshooters (Hafkin and Taggart,2001).

In the United States, females comprise a minority inmid to upper-level IT-related jobs, notwithstandingthe fact that 50 per cent of Internet users in the coun-try are women (Taggart and O’Gara, 2000). Forinstance, only 9 per cent of engineers, 28.5 per cent ofcomputer programmers and 26.9 per cent of systemsanalysts in the United States are females. Women,however, reportedly constitute the majority (85 per

cent) of data entry workers. Moreover, there are gen-der disparities in the salaries between men and womenin IT in the United States. According to Taggart andO’Gara, women in IT career jobs earn 67 per cent ofwhat their male counterparts earn. It is to be expectedthat this disparity would be much wider in developingcountries. The authors cite the profile of women train-ees in an ICT school in Brazil, which shows moreenrolment in word processing courses that would pre-pare these women for support and secretarial posi-tions. In contrast, the networking or programmingcourses are predominantly attended by their malecounterparts, who would thus obviously be equippedfor higher-paying jobs and more remunerative ITcareer paths. The authors suggest therefore that trendsin access to and use of IT are not sufficient indicatorsfor the equitable participation of women in the infor-mation society. Instead, what should be looked at ishow women use the Internet and what skills they areequipped with, as these would determine their role inand contribution to the digital economy.

In order to meet the impending skill shortages in crit-ical areas, women must therefore be prepared forcareers at all levels of the ICT sector, from data entryto software design, network management and ITentrepreneurship. In considering how ICTs and theInternet could benefit women economically andsocially, policy-makers should think beyond womenselling their crafts via the web, to women selling theirskills as website designers, network managers or ITservices consultants.

4. Gender�differentiation�in�IT�education�and�training

Women in developing countries do not yet find it easyto obtain suitable jobs or income-generating work inthe fields of network management, web design or soft-ware development, because they are not equipped withthe necessary skills. The explanation does not neces-sarily lie in discrimination against women in centres ofeducation and training in developing countries. Indeveloping as well as in developed countries, there aredifficulties in attracting and retaining women in ICTtraining and education. An example used by Taggartand O’Gara (2000) from the experience of Cisco’sinternational Networking Academy Program (CNAP)provides some answers to why women’s participationin IT training has been minimal (box 10).



0

5 000

10 000

15 000

20 000

1994/ 95 1995/ 96 1996/ 97 1997/98 1998/ 99

UK first-year, full-time, first-degree computer science students, 1994/95-1998/99

Male Female

It is not a foregone conclusion that the experiences ofdeveloped countries are going to be replicated in thedeveloping ones, where the choice of career andemployment opportunities for women is more limited.The IT enrolment gender profiles for the UnitedKingdom and the Philippines shown in charts 7 and 8provide a number of interesting insights.

Box�10

W omen’s�participation�in�IT�education�and�training

Cisco Networking Academy Program (CNAP) is an international training program that teaches students to design,build, and maintain computer networks. The CNAP curriculum is offered in over 70 countries and taught through web-based modules facilitated by on-site instructors in secondary schools, technical colleges, universities, and non-governmental organizations. Minimum education requirements are an eighth grade reading and math level. Recent dataindicate that overall, 22% of CNAP students in emerging market countries are female. As a result of Cisco’s interest inexpanding the number of women in CNAP, Cisco Systems is supporting the Academy for Educational Developmentto conduct research on female participation in the CNAP in order to develop strategies for increasing female enrolmentand completion.

Students and instructors in Cisco’s program voice a common message that once women are in the programme, theyexcel, and in fact perform better than male students.

Source: Taggart and O’Gara (2000).

Female enrolment in IT courses is lower in both coun-tries. However, in the Philippines, where employ-mentand career prospects are more limited than in theUnited Kingdom, opportunities for overseas workdepict a higher proportion of women graduating inICT. While women lag behind their male counterpartsin ICT enrolment, they are ahead of males in terms of

Chart�7Gender�profile�of�enrolment�in�IT�courses�in�the�United�K ingdom,�1994/95-1998/99

Source: Connor et al. (2001).



0

10 000

15 000

20 000

25 000

30 000

1983 1984 1985 1986 1987 1988 1989 1990 1991 1992

Enr

olm

ent

0

200

400

600

800

1 000

1 2 00

1 400

Gra

duat

es

EnrolmentGraduates

IT enrolment and graduates in the Philippines, by sex (1983-1992)

FemaleFemale

Male Male

5 000

the number of computer graduates. The large gapbetween enrolment and graduation figures in the Phil-ippines, for men as well as for women, is accounted forby the fact that students often find it difficult to con-tinue with training because of its high cost, which isprivately borne. In the United Kingdom, as cited byConnor et al. (2001), there is even a declining trend inthe percentage of female computer science graduates– 21 per cent in 1998/1999 as compared with 22 percent in 1994-1997 (Millar and Jagger, 2001).

Chart�8Gender�profile�of�IT�enrolment�and�graduates�in�the�Philippines,�1983-1992

Source of raw data: Commission on Higher Education, Department of Education, Cultureand Sports, Philippines.

To increase the number of women in the IT educationand training tracks, computers and the Internet shouldbe integrated early on into school curricula to encour-age girls to pursue science and mathematics courses.Greater awareness of how ICT skills could lead to awide range of careers for women will attract them intothe ICT field. A study conducted by the Carnegie Mel-lon University in the United States indicates that earlyexposure to science and technology could changewomen’s perceptions of IT programmes (box 11).

Box�11Carnegie�Mellon�University�on�attracting�women�into�IT�programs

Research by the Carnegie Mellon University (CMU) in the U.S. indicates that adapting science and technology curriculamay change women’s perceptions of IT programs and consequently, attract more girls and women to this field. Forexample, CMU’s research showed that female computer-science students were more interested than male students inthe “context” of computing. 44% of women interviewed, vs. 9% of the men students, link their interest in computersto other arenas. They emphasized the importance of “doing something” with their skills and “connecting computerscience to ‘real-world problems.’ ”Other U.S.-based research has similar findings, drawing the conclusion that “insuring science and technology areconsidered in their social context…may be the most important change that can be made in science teaching for allpeople, both male and female.” As a result of their research, CMU has adapted their curriculum by, among otherstrategies, integrating non-science disciplines into their computer-science program and offering a computer sciencecourse in which students work with community non-profits to apply their skills to community issues. After 4 years, thenumber of females enrolled in the computer-science program at CMU increased from 8% in 1995 to 37% in 1999. Thisidea is not new. Experiential education theory has familiarized us with the notion that learners may respond morefavorably to a subject when it is taught with practical application to the ‘real world’ context. Yet, when applied to ITtraining, these findings offer some new strategies for expanding the number of girls and young women pursuing scienceand technology education and careers.

Source: Taggart and O’Gara (2000).



D. Other�factors�affecting�women�in�the�digital�economy

Apart from skills and training, there are a number ofother constraints that prevent women from fullyengaging in the opportunities created by the digitaleconomy. These obstructing factors, described below,are essentially access to Internet technologies, availa-bility of credit or financing, the language of the Inter-net and other social and cultural barriers.

1. Access�to�Internet�technologies

Many researchers and policy makers have expressedconcern that inequality in access to Internet technol-ogy will increase the existing polarity between coun-tries as well as between groups within a country. Insuch discussions on the digital divide, gender issueshave received attention. The ITU (1999) gave a timelywarning on impending cyber sex discrimination, sinceit viewed cyberspace as a predominantly male areawhere the technical and managerial roles are assumedby men. Its World Telecommunication DevelopmentReport 2002 (WTDR) portrays a different and moreoptimistic future. The spread of very small apertureterminal (VSAT) technology and mobile telephonyhas considerably narrowed the teledensity gapbetween the developed and developing world.17 Also,the third-generation mobile telephone promises tobring networking technology in a cost-effective way towomen who are not privileged, even in the rural areas.

Access to infrastructure alone, in the absence of accessto market and skills, will not enhance participation ine-commerce.18 Human resource development issuesthat focus on technical and marketing skills shouldperhaps feature as prominently as infrastructure in apolicy framework. The cost of infrastructure, how-ever, is likely to remain a major issue for both womenand men, particularly in the poorer countries. In Bang-ladesh, for example, the cost of a computer equalsnearly two years’ salary for a professional person, anda modem costs more than a cow (Mitter, 2001).

The collective use of telephone and Internet facilitiesto some extent helps, or might help, traditionally dis-advantaged groups, such as women, to overcome thechallenges of infrastructure constraints. The use ofcyberkiosks and Internet cafes are examples of collec-tive use facilities that come from the market-orientedprivate sector. Telecentres present possibilities of col-lective use with subsidies and support from donoragencies and the public sector.

Concerns about bandwidth are often overlooked inthe discussion of collective use. To conduct e-com-merce in a sustainable and efficient way, it is notenough to have connectivity – the right amount ofbandwidth is also needed. Developing countries gen-erally lag behind the developed ones in a dramatic wayin terms of access to bandwidth. According to the ITU(2002), there is an uneven distribution of bandwidthsamong countries – for example, the 400,000 citizensof Luxembourg between them have more interna-tional Internet bandwidth than Africa’s 760 million cit-izens. Given their position in the economy and in soci-ety in poorer parts of the world, it is likely that womenmore than men will have problems in having access toadequate bandwidth necessary for conducting e-com-merce. This is an issue that policy makers should beconcerned with.

The�gender�digital�divide

Disaggregation of Internet usage by gender is difficultto obtain, especially from developing countries, and ifavailable the data are not very reliable and comparable.However, even if the figures are not reliable, the num-bers of women Internet users are very likely to besmall in developing countries, considering that statis-tics that are not even disaggregated by gender showalready a very small or insignificant proportion ofInternet access for the entire population. Some pre-liminary indicators provided by Hafkin and Taggart(2001) show that of the total number of Internet usersin 2000, women accounted for 22 per cent in Asia, 38per cent in Latin America and 6 per cent in the MiddleEast. No figures were given for the African region asa whole. These data were based on marketing studiescompiled by e-commerce consulting firms (table 15).

What is borne out by these statistics is the apparentabsence of a correlation between female Internet usersand female GDP19, female literacy, or the percentageof female technical and professional employment, aswell as of gender empowerment as represented by theGender Development Index (GDI).20 As explained bythe authors of the study, these figures support theirhypothesis that women Internet users in developingcountries come mainly from the educated, urban elite,and are hence not representative of women in theentire country.

Home access to the Internet in many developingcountries is a rare phenomenon. The woman lawyerreferred to in box 12 is an example of women profes-sionals in developing countries who encounter diffi-



culties in accessing the Internet not because they donot own computers but simply because they do noteven have telephone lines, which is a basic Internetinfrastructure. Unlikely to have computers at home,most women in developing countries also cannot

Country

Womenas % ofInternetusers,2000

TotalwomenInternetusers

in 000s

TotalnumberInternetusers

in 000s

Internetusersas %

of totalpopulation

Populationin 000s

Femaleprof. &tech.

workersas % of

total

Femaleliteracy

rates

FemaleGDP percapita

($)

GDIrank1/174

United States 51.1 83 479 170 280 60 283 800 53.1 99 23 540 3

Philippines 51.0 76.5 150 0.6 77 726 65.1 94.3 2 510 65

South Africa 51.0 645.6 1 266 4.2 42 835 46.7 83.2 4 637 84

Brazil 43.0 1 075 2 500 2.1 169 807 63.3 83.9 3 813 67

Croatia 42.0 63 150 4.3 4 672 n.a. 96.4 3 557 50

Mexico 42.0 567 1 350 2.5 98 553 45.2 87.9 4 594 48

Estonia 38.0 57 150 14.1 1 421 66.8 99 4 236 49

RussianFederation 38.0 4 560 12 000 1.8 146 861 n.a. 98.8 3 503 61

Zambia 37.5 1.13 3 0.2 9 461 31.9 67.5 753 125

Uganda 31.5 4.73 15 0.1 22 167 n.a. 35 944 131

China 30.4 6 840 22 500 0.7 1 265 530 45.1 74.5 2 485 79

India 23.0 115 500 0.2 983 377 20.5 39.4 902 112

Poland 18.7 295.6 1 581 5.4 38 607 61.2 99 5 061 40

Ethiopia 13.9 0.83 6 0.1 58 390 n.a. 29.2 349 172

Slovakia 12.0 60 500 13.0 5 393 59.7 99 6 366 39

Czech Rep. 12.0 48 400 6.8 10 286 54.1 99 7 952 34

Senegal 12.0 0.90 7.5 0.3 9 723 n.a. 24.8 1 253 127

Lithuania 10.0 7 70 2.9 3 600 67.5 99 3 323 55

Jordan 6.0 3.7 60.8 1.8 4 435 n.a. 81.8 1 429 n.a.

Table�15

W omen’s�Internet�usage�in�selected�countries

afford to use public access sites. User fees charged forInternet access at public venues may not be affordablefor women, who are generally less able than men topay fees (averaging $1 to $3 an hour) (Hafkin andTaggart; 2001).

Box�12

Accounts�of�difficulties�in�accessing�basic�Internet�infrascruture

A woman lawyer in Uganda recognises the importance of international Internet connectivity for information, supportand advocacy, but has not been able to afford or obtain a separate phone line. To use e-mail, she drives 20 kilometersto the University library, presents a copy of the information to be sent either in manuscript or diskette, and pays oneUS dollar per page to send a message and 50 US cents per page to receive a message. She has to wait two days to pickup replies, but most e-mail she sends never arrive at their destinations, because the addresses are keyed in wrongly bythe library personnel.

Source: Huyer (1997).

Source: Hafkin and Taggart (2001).



When women do have access in developing countries,it is usually in the workplace. This creates a dichotomybetween the use of ICT by women as tools of produc-tion (e.g. routine office work, data entry, program-ming) and tools of communication (e.g. creation andexchange of information). As to the latter, womenworking for non-governmental organizations haveused the Internet mainly for political advocacy to pro-tect women’s rights and women’s causes ranging fromdomestic violence issues to sexual slavery.

2. Availability�of�finance

Apart from access to infrastructure and education(skills), lack of capital is the third key obstacle facingwomen (especially women entrepreneurs) wishing toengage in e-commerce and e-business. To start upICT-enabled businesses or to employ ICT tools toenhance existing businesses, women will need capitalfrom special financial institutions in developing coun-tries that lend specifically to women entrepreneurswho have no collateral, and who work mostly in theinformal sector. The most likely source of the neces-sary financial capital could be microcredit schemesthat specifically target women because of high take-upand repayment experiences and social dividendsreaped from lending to them (Hafkin and Taggart,2001). In this sense, ICT-enabled businesses are nodifferent from other traditional microenterprises inwhich women in developing countries are engaged.They both involve light-based manufacturing, trade, orservice activities; employ about five people or less,mostly family members; have low barriers to marketentry; are home-based; and require less professionalexperience and knowledge than those of their malepartners. The only differentiating factor is the use ofnew technologies.

The microfinance or microcredit programmes areaimed at empowering women beyond just the settingup or expansion of microenterprises. Specifically,microcredit schemes increase women’s income levelsand their economic independence, enhance theirautonomy over household decisions about expendi-tures, promote positive attitudes to women’s social andpolitical roles in communities, and provide them withinformation and support networks to protect theirindividual and collective interests at the local andmacro levels.

The outreach of the world’s largest microcreditschemes shows a varied performance ranging from a100 per cent outreach in countries such as India,Malaysia, Bangladesh and Mali to less than 50 per cent

in Uganda, Nigeria, Ethiopia, Nepal and France (seeannex 2 for a detailed description of the 34 largestmicrofinance schemes). These schemes could be use-ful entry points for policy makers in a programmeaimed at facilitating women’s opportunities in ICT-related business.

In the case of ICT-enabled businesses, the GrameenPhone Project in Bangladesh described in section Bstands out as a best practice model combining lendingto women’s microenterprises with literacy training andskills development. As described by Hafkin and Tag-gart (2001), among the two million borrowers of theGrameen Bank, who received wireless phones as anin-kind loan to village phone operators, 75 per cent arewomen. The operators resell the mobile phone serviceto fellow villagers, earning an average annual incomeof $300 as against the national average per capitaincome of $286. About 90 per cent of the womenoperators are married and have no formal education.The phone business can be managed simultaneouslywith another business or while doing householdchores. The major advantages of this type of ICT-ena-bled enterprise are the minimal educational require-ments (just some basic mechanical aptitude), and thesmall capital needed, enough to be supported bymicrocredit schemes. There are positive externalitiesalso in accelerating rural development where telecom-munication density is sparse.

Another successful example of ICT-enabling businesswith a microfinancing component is the use of smartcards by Indian women milk collectors in Rajasthan.The smart cards were used to record the quality, fatcontent and sales of milk to distributors and served astheir bankbook, thereby empowering them to makespending decisions and increasing their profits whileeliminating the middlemen (called dhudhwala).21

3. Language�of�the�Internet

The dominance of English as the language of theInternet represents a serious problem for the majorityof the world’s population, which does not speak Eng-lish. Women without access to formal schooling thatallows them to learn foreign languages are again mar-ginalized, but so are men in countries or regions whereEnglish is not “the” language, such as Latin America,the Middle East, French-speaking Africa and EasternEurope. According to Hafkin and Taggart (2001), lan-guage was among the main barriers to Internet usagethat women cited in their response to the Associationfor Progressive Communications (APC) Women’sNetworking Survey in 1996. Even where women do



have equal access to formal schooling, they may needto receive additional training in foreign language skills,for which time and resources will be scarce.

Hafkin and Taggart (2001) also noted that “even userswith basic proficiency in English experience discom-fort that discourages Internet use when using otherthan their native language”. They cited a technicaltraining programme conducted in Mexico, which dis-covered that users with a low English proficiency levelwere reluctant to access online help centres simplybecause it was in English.

While the predominance of English is a threat to thesocial inclusion of non-English-speaking women inthe digital economy, the increasing trend towards mul-tilingual content provides a digital opportunity interms of language translation in software developmentand in web design in native languages. As with other

4. Social�and�cultural�factors

Many of the previously discussed factors affectingwomen’s participation in the information economy aredirectly linked to the roles and positions of women insociety and the family. In low-income families, parentstend to give priority to the education of boys ratherthan girls.23 Also, women often have less control overfamily income (in particular if men are the mainincome earners), which makes it more difficult forthem to pursue (fee-based) training in IT-related fieldsor spend family income on ICT access and use. Pre-vailing gender stereotypes discourage girls from pur-suing science, technology or engineering careers in

many developing countries, especially in Africa, wherethe numbers of female students in these fields are par-ticularly low (UNESCO, 1999).

In some cultures, women’s presence in public isrestricted. Women may not be able to travel toundergo training or attend courses by male teachers,while at the same time few female teachers in the ITand engineering fields may be available. Also, womenmay not be allowed to use public Internet access cen-tres or telecentres and hence will depend more heavilyon home-based access. Lack of interaction with thepublic also restricts women’s opportunities to practiseforeign language skills. Even in societies wherewomen’s presence in public is not restricted, the cur-

remote services (see section B.2), this could work wellfor women wishing to combine household responsi-bilities with income-earning activities.

The other implication of the predominance of Englishas the Internet language is the close correlation of out-sourcing and English proficiency. Earlier in this chap-ter, it was indicated that outsourcing trends will be onthe increase (see section B). Since the top two out-sourcing markets – the United States and the UnitedKingdom22 – are both English-speaking, those devel-oping countries that would want to tap those marketswould have to learn English. English proficiency hasbeen mentioned by outsourcing companies as one ofthe key requirements (see box 13). This gives rise tosome policy implications for improving the schoolingand literacy of women where a second language –English – should be learned.

Box�13

Opportunities�in�offshore�outsourcing�and�English�proficiency

American companies unable to find, hire, and retain skilled IT workers at home are finding a vast pool of highlyeducated technology savvy, English-speaking workers available overseas. “These companies are sending IT projectsoffshore to compensate for the limited pool of talent available in the United States”, according to Cynthia Doyle,research manager for IDC’s IT and Offshore Outsourcing Strategies Programme.

IDC believes India is best positioned to capture a large part of the offshore outsourcing opportunity. However, otherregions have potential to develop as major sources of offshore outsourcing, including Canada, Mexico, the Caribbean,South Africa, Israel, Ireland, and Eastern Europe.

“To be a successful provider of outsourcing services, a region must demonstrate fluency in English, a vast pool of ITtalent, a solid infrastructure, and experience doing business with Western companies”.

Source: IDC, “Offshore outsourcers are getting involved in increasingly complex IT projects”, downloadable from ww.idc.com/getdoc.jhtml?containerId=pr50223



rent predominance of male customers in cybercafes inmany countries discourages women from using thesepublic access places (Hafkin and Taggart, 2001).

Time is another constraint particularly felt by women,given that they assume most household and childcareresponsibilities, often also caring for elderly familymembers. While home-based Internet access allowswomen to save time in their business activities, gener-ally they have less free time to spend using the technol-ogies (at home, at work or in public access centres) orto attend IT, language or other e-business-relevanttraining.

E. Conclusions�and�policy�recommendations

This chapter has attempted to shed light on the way e-commerce and the digital economy impact on womenand men in developing countries. Using examplesfrom the countries concerned, it has described theopportunities offered to women as well as the con-straints they face in taking full advantage of the poten-tial of ICT and e-commerce. In this process, policymakers will have to play a key role in creating an envi-ronment favourable to the participation of women inthe digital economy. The following draws some con-clusions and outlines areas of possible policy interven-tion. Annex 3 lists a set of policy options identified byan UNCTAD intergovernmental expert meeting ongender.

The review of the literature has shown that with regardto women’s taking advantage of e-commerce and ICT-enabled work, the implications for policy point toaccess to education and schooling, Internet infrastruc-ture and technologies, financial capital, and the pro-motion of e-business and IT-enabled employmentopportunities. Improving women’s access to Internettechnologies requires extensive infrastructure buildingof basic telecommunications (including wireless andsatellite) in rural and peri-urban areas, which are cur-rently underserved in many developing countries. Thisshould involve common facilities such as telecentresand phone shops that offer public Internet servicesand are located in venues which women frequent, suchas markets, churches, health clinics, schools and postoffices. Microcredit programmes should target thepoorest, marginalized women, improving deliverymechanisms that involve men so as to increase theirperception of the intervention as supplementing fam-ily income instead of being a threat to status. Womenshould be allowed greater control over their incomes

and be given greater powers of decision about familyexpenditures. A perhaps more radical implicationwould be the empowerment of women by allowingthem titles to conjugal assets so that they could even-tually be able to qualify for financing from the formalfinancial sector.

In the area of job creation, policy makers need to pro-mote IT-enabled employment such as teleworking.The discussions in this chapter have shown that indeveloping countries institution-based teleworkinggenerally appears to be a more attractive option thanhome-based teleworking, both for working motherswith young children and for management. For rela-tively highly skilled women, for example in softwareprogramming and the media, home-based telework-ing, at certain stages of their lives, could provide asolution to problems of combining childcare responsi-bilities with those of ICT-related professions. But evenfor these women, policy makers need to ensure betterprovision of childcare facilities so that they do not set-tle for home-based and/or less challenging occupa-tions because there is little choice. In other words, apolicy framework needs to take into account the com-plexities of women’s aspirations and life cycles withregard to enhancing their participation in all segmentsof e-commerce.

It is crucial to highlight the role and importance of theinformal sector in the developing countries, given thatthe majority of the workforce work either as employ-ees in non-contractual jobs or as miniscule or small-scale entrepreneurs. Again, women make up the larg-est share of workers in the informal sector in manydeveloping countries. Women in small-scale businessface additional hurdles as regards making use of ICTeither for marketing or for advertising because of theirlimited access to market information, finance, assetsand infrastructure. This is where the real challenge liesfor policy makers in their efforts to bridge the (gender)digital divide and include the poorest segments of thepopulation.

Need�for�women�in�ICT�decision-making

Women should participate more in ICT policy-makingin order to ensure that gender issues are beingaddressed. However, there is a lack of women in deci-sion-making structures in information technologypolicy-making and governance in developing coun-tries. Hafkin and Taggart (2001) found that only 5.5per cent of senior government officials responsible forinformation and communication technologies indeveloping countries were women, although these few



were in top positions, such as ministers of communi-cation or telecommunication (in Mali, South Africaand Colombia) and deputy ministers of communica-tion (in Angola, Belarus, the Czech Republic, Ghana,Kyrgyzstan and the United Republic of Tanzania).These women could have an influence on the courseof information and technology development in theircountries and in regional and global forums. Hafkinand Taggart also looked at the number of women inITU Study Groups in major areas of communicationsand technology development; such groups can influ-ence the direction of the development of informationand communication infrastructure and standards indeveloping countries. Out of 51 persons, there wereonly two women, and no women from Africa, Asia orLatin America. Similarly, at the Internet Corporationfor Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN), thereare no women from the developing world among the19 directors. Policies should thus be geared towardsincluding more women in ICT decision- making posi-tions at the highest levels.

Finally, the question of gender in relation to e-com-merce has to be placed among the wider issues ofdevelopment and growth. As we have seen, the cur-rent share of developing countries in both B2B andB2C is minute. Asia is the leading region in the devel-oping world in e-commerce, followed by Latin Amer-ica. The share of African and other developing coun-tries is virtually nil. Even within Asia, these areconcentrated in a handful of countries such as India,Malaysia, China and the Philippines. Therefore, thequestion of gender should not be addressed solelyfrom the distributive point of view at this stage.Rather, it has to be addressed as a strategy for harness-ing women’s potential skills along with men’s inendowing countries with comparative advantages forparticipating in e-commerce and e-business, nationallyand globally.

1. Policy�recommendations�for�enhancing�skills�and�training

Education is by far the most important policy inter-vention for improving the ability of girls and womenin developing countries to participate in the informa-tion society. Apart from ensuring equal access for girlsand boys to primary and secondary schooling, womenalso need to get better access to business and technicaleducation, especially at tertiary levels. This could beaddressed by both the public and private sectors in thefollowing manner:

• A key strategy would be to focus attention ongenerating demand for IT education fromwomen themselves through awareness pro-grammes. Exposing girls to computers and theInternet and to science and mathematics disci-plines at early stages should be initiated by Gov-ernments, particularly education ministries,before gender stereotypes start to influencefemale attitudes.

• A second key element would entail follow-uptraining on ICT-related courses for womenalready in the workforce. It may be of benefitfor companies to sponsor women in ICT train-ing programmes, since women are potentialsources of scarce skills for occupations andfunctions that are now being enabled by com-puters and the Internet. For women in theinformal sector, Governments or the privatesector should build IT training institutes whichcharge affordable tuition fees and are flexiblewith respect to women’s time constraints.

• A third element would be ensuring that womenacquire the right IT skills. Training must gobeyond teaching women how to use a wordprocessor or how to enter data, towards actualIT creation and production such as hardwareand software development, web authoring anddesign, network management and computertroubleshooting. Women will also need businessand entrepreneurial skills in order to apply theseIT skills: if they are to use ICT in managing theirsmall businesses, they need to be trained in howto develop business plans, conduct market sur-veys, and search for information on fundingsources and the like. Women engaged in remoteprocessing and distant work need to receiveappropriate training in order to stay in employ-ment and business as and when skill require-ments alter in response to changes in technolo-gies. And women, particularly young women,need to be provided with opportunities to learnforeign languages (especially English).

2. Other�policies�to�enhance�the�participation�of�women�in

the�digital�economy

• Providing common access facilities, such ascommunity centres, that reduce the commutingtime of professional and business women; andpublic Internet services in venues that womenfrequent, such as markets, churches, health clin-ics, schools and post offices;



• Creating an appropriate environment wherenew modes of working – such as teleworking –could enhance women’s participation in e-com-merce as employees or freelances, by improvingtheir access to Internet technologies in ruraland peri-urban areas;

• Providing facilities for childcare so that womencan continue working in the IT-enabled sector;

• Raising awareness in the corporate sector of theadvantages of teleworking for female employ-ees as well as for companies;

• Developing and publicizing the availability of acritical mass of multilingual and computer-liter-ate female workforce to attract customer careservices work from national as well as transna-tional companies.

• Supporting the establishment of telecentres asincubators and facilitators of small business ininformation and communication services;

• Helping to develop multilingual websites inorder to make it possible for women, with lessaccess to education and English literacy, to surfthe Internet for market and business informa-tion that includes legal procedures and regula-tory frameworks;

• Highlighting and, when possible, rectifying legaland cultural practices that constitute barriers towomen’s entry into the e-economy;

• Promoting business and entrepreneurial pros-pects for women in the e-economy by offeringventure capital and micro finance to womenentrepreneurs to set up small businesses in ICT-related and remote processing services;

• Evaluating microcredit programmes for bring-ing the poorest, marginalized women into theorbit of e-commerce;

• Strengthening the advocacy power of NGOsthat lobby for women to have greater controlover their incomes and over decisions on familybudgets and expenditures.

Notes

11 Many other United Nations bodies have started to mainstream gender in their work programmes on ICT and develop-ment. In particular, the UN Division for the Advancement of Women (DAW), in collaboration with the ITU and the UNICT Task Force, is organizing an Expert Group Meeting on the role of ICT for the advancement and empowerment ofwomen, to be held in the Republic of Korea in November 2002. The UN Commission on the Status of Women (CSW)will consider the same subject at its 47th session in March 2003. The outcome of both meetings will contribute to theWSIS.

12 See www.worldbank.org/gender/digitaldivide/interventionsasia.htm

13 Ibid.

14 See www.tortasperu.com

15 See www.ethiogift.com

16 See www.elsouk.com

17 www.idc.com

18 In India the average annual salary of a computer programmer is less than one sixth of that of a programmer in the UnitedStates. In the Philippines it is one seventh. The average annual salary of a medical transcription secretary is $1,200 in Indiacompared with $25,000 per annum in the United States. See Mitter and Sen (2000, pp. 2263-2268).

19 Communique India (2002); www4.gartner.com; see also chapter 9 (on e-services).

10 www.nasscom.org

11 Interview by Swasti Mitter with Sushanto Sen, Deputy Director of CII, on 8 March 2002.

12 Back-office operations are the offsite delivery of a range of non-core service functions, including routine administrationtasks, customer service and technical support. They involve the use of an outsourcing base in another country (Commu-nique India, 2002).



13 www.outsourcing.com

14 Although the concept has received most attention in developed countries, the United Nations University Institute for NewTechnologies (UNU-INTECH), in Maastricht, carried out two research projects in India and Malaysia, exploring thepotential and spread of teleworking in developing countries. See Mitter (2000) and Ng (2001).

15 “Voice recognition aims to lower call-center costs”, 22 October 2001, www.informationweek.com/story/IWK20011018S0084; “Smarter voice recognition technology will cut call center costs”, 28 May 2002, Speech TechnologyMagazine, www.speechtechmag.com/cgi-bin/udt/ im.display.printable?client.id= speechtechmag-news&story.id=778 -4k - I ; “Coming soon: web sites with a voice”, November 2000, www.internetwk.com/story/ INW20001109S0005.

16 “Study sees IT worker shortage in 2002”, 6 May 2002, www.news.com.com/2100-1017-899730.html

17 In 1991 total telephone penetration (fixed-line plus mobile telephones) stood at 49.0 in developed nations, 3.3 in emergingnations and 0.3 in the least developed countries (LDCs). A decade later, the corresponding levels were 121.1, 18.7 and 1.1.The ratio between developed and emerging nations dropped by more than half from 15.1 to 6.1, while the gap betweendeveloped and LDCs dropped from 171.1 to 112.1. Emerging nations have done particularly well and, if anything, thereis a growing gap between them and the LDCs. The gap between emerging nations and LDCs rose from 12.1 to 17.1 (ITU,2002, p. 17).

18 The reason for women or men not using the Internet is, according to the WTDR, not so much related to cost as to lackof relevance. A survey undertaken by Ipsos-Reid and incorporated in the WTDR indicates that only 12 per cent of respon-dents gave “cost” as the reason for not using the Internet, as compared with 40 per cent who felt there was no need touse it (p. 26). Since the survey does not clarify the characteristics and geographical coverage of the sample, it is difficult togeneralize from the findings.

19 Based on the UNDP Human Development Indicators, female GDP is roughly derived on the basis of the ratio of thefemale non-agricultural wage to the male non-agricultural wage, the female and male shares of the economically activepopulation, total female and male population, and GDP per capita (PPP $). For further details see hdr.undp.org.

20 The GDI, developed by UNDP, simply adjusts the Human Development Index to take account of inequalities betweenmen and women in life expectancy, literacy and income. Fore a definition, see UNDP Human Development Reports.

21 World Bank (2002).

22 United States-based companies alone are projected to increase outsourcing spending threefold to over $17.6 billion in 2005from under $5.5 billion in 2000. In Europe, the United Kingdom is becoming the leading outsourcing market, capturing22 out of the 34 mega contracts (worth over $1 billion) that went to the region.

23 Girls comprise two thirds of school-age children in the developing world without access to basic education (Hafkin andTaggart, 2001, p. 27).

References�and�Bibliography

Arun S and Arun T (2002). “ICTs, gender and development: Women in software production in Kerala”, Journal of InternationalDevelopment, vol. 14, issue 1, pp. 39-50.

Brisco R (2002). “Turning analog women into a digital workforce: Plugging women into the new Asia economy”, DigitalDivide Network, www.digitaldividenetwork.org/content/stories/ index.cfm?key=135

Busse T and Brandel M (1998). “The skills struggle: It’s time to restock the global IT labour pool through training and edu-cation”, Computerworld, 7 December, www.computerworld.com/cwi/story/0,1199,NAV47_STO33161,00.html

Communique India (2002). Vol. 11, no. 2, February.

Connor H, Hillage J, Millar, J and Willison R (2001). “An Assessment of skill needs in information and communication tech-nology”, Institute for Employment Studies, draft report downloadable from www.skillsbase.dfee.gov.uk/Downloads/ICTreport.pdf.

Dillon N and Cole-Gomolski B (1999). “Depth of IT skills shortage depends on timing, training”, Computerworld, 5 July,www.computerworld.com/cwi/story/0,1199,NAV47_ STO36279,00.html



Dutton G (2001). “The war for IT talent is over and the talent won”, International Data Corporation ITForecaster, 20 March,www.idc.com/getdoc.jhtml?containerId =itf20010320

Economic and Social Commission for Asia and the Pacific (ESCAP) (2001). “Report of the Expert Group Meeting to ReviewICT Policy from a Gender Perspective”, 18-19 December 2001.

Gaio FJ (1995). “Women in software programming; experience of Brazil”. In: Mitter S (ed.), Women Encounter Technology: Chang-ing Patterns of Employment in the Third World, London, Routledge, pp. 214-218.

Gothoskar S (ed.) (2000). “Nature of teleworking in key sectors”, Economic and Political Weekly, vol. XXXV, no 26, pp. 2293-2298.

Guthand R et al. (1998). “Asian view: Despite rampant unemployment, lack of IT skills threatens Asia’s growth”, Computerworld,7 December, www.computerworld.com/cwi/story/ 0,1199,NAV47_STO33162,00.html

Hafkin N and Taggart N (2001). “Gender, Information Technology, and Developing Countries: An Analytic Study”, USAID,www.usaid.gov/wid/pubs/hafnoph.pdf

Huyer S (1997). “Supporting Women’s Use of Information Technologies for Sustainable Development”, IDRC, downloadablefrom www.wigsat.org/it/womenicts.html

IDC (2000). “A Study of the Worldwide Networking Skills Shortage”, www.idc.com

IDC (2002). “Internet Usage Increasing Rapidly Across Southeast Europe”, www.idc.com

ITU (1999). Challenges to the Network: Internet for Development, Geneva.

ITU (2002). World Telecommunication Development Report 2002, Geneva.

Johnson S (1998). “Gender and Microfinance: Guidelines for Good Practice”, Centre for Development Studies, University ofBath, www.gdrc.org/icm/wind/gendersjonson.html

Mayoux L (1997). “The Magic Ingredient? Microfinance and Women’s Empowerment”, briefing paper prepared for the MicroCredit Summit in Washington, www.gdrc.org/icm/wind/magic.html

Millar J and Jagger N (2001). “Women in ITEC Courses and Careers”, Department of Trade and Industry, United Kingdom,November.

Mitter S (2001). “Asian Women in the Digital Economy: Policies for Participation”, UNDP (Malaysia).

Mitter S (2000). “Teleworking and teletrade in India; Diverse perspectives and visions”, Economic and Political Weekly,vol. XXXV, no. 26, pp. 2241 – 2252.

Mitter S and Efendioglu U (1997). “Teleworking in a global context”. In: Virtually Free? – Gender, Work and Spatial Choice,Swedish National Board for Industrial and Technical Development (NUTEK), Stockholm.

Mitter S and Efendioglu U (1999). “Is Asia the destination for ’runaway’ information processing work? Implications for tradeand employment”. In: Mitter, S. and Bastos, M.-I. (eds.), Europe and Developing Countries in the Globalised Information Econ-omy, London, Routledge.

Mitter S and Sen A (2000). “Can Calcutta become another Bangalore?”, Economic and Political Weekly, vol.XXXV, no. 26,pp. 2263 – 2268.

Motsenigos A and Hoffman C (2001). “International B2B initiatives require web-site globalization”, www.idc.com

Ng C (ed.) (2001). Teleworking and Development in Malaysia, UNDP and Southbound Press, Penang, Malaysia.

Ng C and Khoo KJ (2000). “Teleworking in Malaysia”, Economic and Political Weekly, vol. XXXV, no. 26, pp. 2308 – 2313.

Taggart N and O’Gara C (2000). “Training Women for Leadership and Success in IT”, Academy for Educational Develop-ment, September, www.worldbank.org/gender/ digitaldivide/techknow.pdf

UNESCO (1999). Statistical Yearbook 1999, Paris.

World Bank (2002). “Using information and communications technology to reduce poverty in rural India”, PREMnotes,no. 20, June, www1.worldbank.org/prem/PREMNotes/ premnote70.pdf



ANNEX�1

Table�16IDC’s�services�industry�IT�activity�groupings

Source: IDC (2001), www.idc.com/getdoc.jhtml?containerId=26051&pageType=PRINTFRIENDLY

Table�17IDC’s�services�industry�business�activity�groupings

Planning Implementation Operations Maintenanceand support

IT Educationand training

Processimprovement

Site preparation Asset management Telephone support IT/technical skills training

Operationsassessment

Project management Procurement Parts support Desktop skills training

Benchmarking Test and debug Administrative and operations Remote network monitoring

Professional certification

Needs assessment System configuration Media duplication and replication

Remote diagnostics Learning augmentation

Strategy Installation Systems management Electronic support

Capacity planning Software re-engineering Performance tuning Software maintenance

Changemanagement

Custom software development Network management On-site maintenance

Maintenanceplanning

Packaged software customization Back-up and archiving On-site software support

Design Application interfacing and integration

Business recovery Preventive maintenance

Supplier analysis Relocation services

Systems migration

Documentation

User experience design and analysis

Planning and design Implementation/deployment Support Business skills training Execution/operations

Strategy Custom content development Telephone support Training delivery Asset management

Process improvement Rules specifications Compliance Professional certification Procurement management

Process re-engineering Project management Electronic support Learning augmentation services

Pick and pack

Operations assessment Quality assurance/testing Learning administration Special handling

Benchmarking Environmental assessment Profiling

Needs assessment Business documentation List/database

Change management Relocation support Verification

Designer Site selection and preparation Lead qualification

Supplier analysis Lead distribution

Organizational design Support seminars

Cultural assessment Marketing campaign analysis

Global brand positioning Marketing campaign reporting

Global trade assessment Telesales

Skills assessment Prospecting

Legal and regulatory assessment

Order processing



Planning and design Implementation/deployment Support Business skills training Execution/operations

Capacity planning Invoicing

Shipping

Inventory management

Contract management

Shipment management

Employee performance management

Credit refunds

Time and attendance tracking

Employee records/data management

Cheque processing

Tax and regulatory filing

Payment processing

Records storage and management

Benefits open enrolment

Corporate communications

Benefit administration

Job posting

Candidate identification

Skills and behavioural assessment

Candidate interviews

Background checks

Candidate selection and negotiation

Candidate hiring

Recruiting process reporting

Risk management and site recovery

Equipment maintenance

Facilities management

Administration and operations

Media duplication and distribution

Source: IDC (2001), www.idc.com/getdoc,jhtml?containerId=26051&pageType=PRINTFRIENDLY



ANNEX�II

Table�18Women�reached�by�34�largest�microfinance�schemes

Institution

Total number of poorest

borrowers reported 1998

Total number of poorest women reported 1998

Percentage poorest women reported 1998

Total number of

poorest borrowers

1997

Total number of

poorest women

1997

Growth of women

borrowers

Grameen Bank, Bangladesh 2 400 000 2 280 000 95 2 270 000 2 156 500 123 500

Association of Asian Confederation of Credit Unions, Thailand

1 699 292 900 625 53 1 425 262 726 883 173 742

BRAC, Bangladesh 1 040 000 1 040 000 100 900 000 900 000 140 000

Association for Social Advancement (ASA), Bangladesh

720 208 669 793 93 571 859 548 985 120 808

Proshika Manobik Unnayan Kendra, Bangladesh

640 000 358 400 56 420 000 231 000 127 400

Caribbean Confederation of Credit Unions 400 000 260 000 65 370 000 222 000 38 000

Agricultural Development Bank, Nepal 218 153 59 992 27.5 200 183 50 045 9 947

Caritas, Bangladesh 207 473 130 708 63 125 250 80 160 50 548

Debit Credit and Savings Institution, Ethiopia 168 954 64 202 38 76 257 29 740 34 462

Crédit Mutuel, France (worldwide) 162 271 19 448 12 106 884 11 757 7 691

Working Women’s Forum, India 162 000 162 000 100 148 700 148 700 13 300

Swanirvar Bangladesh 137 490 103 118 75 110 800 80 884 22 234

Country Women’s Association of Nigeria 126 000 113 400 90 90 000 81 000 32 400

People’s Bank of Nigeria 108 000 70 200 65 92 500 64 750 5 450

Amhara Credit and Saving Institution, Ethiopia

94 004 47 002 50 46 647 23 323 23 679

Fight Against Poverty Organisation, Nigeria 75 000 74 250 99 35 500 35 145 39 105

Kafo Jiginew, Mali 67 871 67 871 100 56 899 56 899 10 972

South East Sadish Krishi Samabay Samittee Ltd., Bangladesh

62 000 55 800 90 45 000 40 500 15 300

FINCA International, United States (worldwide)

61 480 57 791 94 65 000 62 400 (4 609)

Amanah Ikhtiar Malaysia 56 087 56 087 100 55 666 55 666 421

Uganda Cooperative Savings and Credit Union, Ltd.

51 935 13 347 26 52 097 13 024 323

Thengamara Mohila Sabuj Sangha, Bangladesh

45 000 45 000 100 20 542 20 542 24 458

National Bank of Cambodia 40 570 32 450 80 26 160 20 930 11 520

Buro, Tangail, Bangladesh 39 000 37 050 95 32 413 30 792 6 258

Association for Rural Development of Poor Areas in Sichuan, P.R. China

37 800 20 790 55 11 827 9 580 11 210

Sri Lanka Business Development Center 37 500 22 500 60 22 500 13 500 9 000

IRED, Zimbabwe 35 000 28 000 80 30 000 24 000 4 000

Alliance of Philippine Partners in Enterprise Development

31 193 30 257 97 23 017 21 867 8390

Fédération des Caisses Populaires du Burkina Faso

30 806 29 266 95 12 095 12 095 17 171

Heed, Bangladesh 30 630 22 972 75 25 862 18 103 4 869

Microcredito Santa Fe de Guanajuato, Mexico

27 817 24 200 87 11 517 10 596 13 604

ACLEDA, Cambodia 25 964 25 704 99 9 099 8 917 16 787

Nigerian Agricultural and Cooperative Bank 24 780 4 460 18 27 777 3 888 572

Fundación para la Promoción y Desarrollo de la Microempresa (PRODEM), Bolivia

24 000 15 600 65 21 000 14 070 1 530

TOTAL 9 088 278 6 942 283 76 7 538 313 5 828 241 1 114 042

Source: www.gdrc.org/icm/wind/summit.html



ANNEX�III

Mainstreaming�gender�in�ICT�policy�

Policy�options�identified�at�the�UNCTAD�Expert�Meeting�on�Mainstreaming�Gender�in�Orderto�Promote�Opportunities,�Geneva,�14-16�November�2001�

Expert Meetings are convened by UNCTAD’s Commissions in order to provide specialized technical expertise onspecific issues within the purview of the relevant commission. Experts are nominated by the Governments ofmember States, but they participate in the meeting in their personal capacities.

Policy� options� identified� for� consideration� by� the� Commission� on� Enterprise,Business�Facilitation�and�Development

1. Recognizing the public goods nature of knowledge and the Internet, Governments should ensure rapid, equi-table and affordable access to the Internet and ICT for women by taking all appropriate measures such as:

(a) Establishing an appropriate infrastructure (through telecentres, Internet cafes, etc.) in order to facilitatewomen’s access to the Internet;

(b) Providing computers and telecommunications at affordable prices to low-income families and specificallywomen entrepreneurs, as demonstrated by countries such as Pakistan;

(c) Involving local governments (in addition to the national Government) in reaching out to rural communi-ties;

(d) Creating broad awareness-raising programmes using mass media and targeting rural areas;

(e) Offering computer and language skills training specifically targeted at women; focusing on distance edu-cation at home or community centres; and offering training courses to women in telecentres at low cost;

(f) Training women in the methods and scope of setting up e-businesses and developing e-commerce;

(g) Promoting the capacity of women as managers and owners of telecentres;

(h) Introducing the appropriate language courses in primary schools;

(i) Providing Internet databases in local languages;

(j) Creating public – private partnerships to facilitate access via the Internet to foreign markets and potentialbusiness partners for women entrepreneurs.

2. They should enhance the number of women in the IT industry by:

(a) Increasing the enrolment of female students in ICT-related courses through specific promotion campaignsand scholarships;

(b) Ensuring the participation of women in the design and development of new technologies;

(c) Ensuring the representation of women in ICT policy making bodies.

3. They should support organizations and grassroots groups involved in assisting women with access to andusage of the Internet and ICT.

Possible�work�areas�for�consideration�by�the�international�community�and�UNCTAD

1. The international community and UNCTAD could contribute towards greater participation of women in thedigital economy by:

(a) Mainstreaming gender in their overall work on ICT and e-commerce;



(b) Promoting ways in which ICT and e-commerce can create new economic opportunities for women andthus contribute towards increasing the competitiveness of developing countries;

(c) Identifying gender-specific opportunities of the digital economy through analytical and case-study-basedwork, including on such issues as: (i) the level of employment provided to women in ICT-related servicessectors; (ii) the extent to which these sectors are involved in export; and (iii) the type of employment for-eign firms provide in these services sectors, from a gender perspective;

(d) Collaborating with Governments and the private sector to incorporate the findings from their analyticalwork into policy dialogue and decision-making;

(e) Developing programmes to facilitate women’s access to and use of ICT and e-commerce tools, specificallythrough transfer of technology and competitive scholarships;

(f) Promoting ways to facilitate women’s access to information and the use of ICT in local government devel-opment, and the establishment of information management systems.

2. The Commission on Science and Technology for Development should formulate guidelines on increasing theparticipation of women in IT during the course of its work on its new substantive theme: Technology devel-opment and capacity building for competitiveness in a digital economy.

e-commerce and development report 2002e-commerce and development report 2002 chapter 3: gender,...

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